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Peter Wood on Bluestone's return to the space

With Bluestone back in the specialist home loan market after a hiatus of 5 years it's easy to think that these initial months will be a struggle but General Manager Peter Wood says the reaction to their return has been positive and the coming year will be all about finding their niche.

Video transcript below:

Anna Temple, Australian Broker Online
Anna Temple: With Bluestone back in the specialist home loan market after a hiatus of 5 years, it’s easy to think that these initial months will be a struggle, but General Manager, Peter Wood says the reaction to their return has been positive and the coming year will be all about finding their niche.

Peter Wood, GM, Bluestone

Peter Wood: Response to Bluestone entering back in the market has been particularly positive. It is not always entering back into a space where you have been away from for 5 years and so we take on board the feedback from all the brokers across the industry. Next 6 to 12 months looks particularly positive, entering back into the market is never an easy task. However we have done lot of research around the market and where it’s heading and we believe there are specific niches which we can play a part in and satisfy a part of the market which isn’t currently catered for. That will overall I guess build our portfolio steadily over a period of time and so in 12 to 18 months’ time we hope to be in a position to go back to the capital markets and do some securitisation of bonds again.

Anna Temple: Wood says that the biggest challenge facing the industry for lenders at least is staying relevant, but when it comes to this Bluestone are doing their homework.

Peter Wood: Biggest challenge I think facing the industry as a whole is for, from a lender’s prospective is to remain relevant in the market place. By that I mean changing, actively changing the way in which they do business through their distributors and remaining as I say relevant to those people in the market. Bluestone are actively looking at different niches in the market where we can add value and that’s across the number of different asset classes which we may enter into in the not too distant future.

Anna Temple: Looking further into the future,Wood says it’s important to first know where the market has been.

Peter Wood: Taking a step back you have got to look at where the market has come from and where it is today. So the market is completely different and what we have found entering back into the market is from the research that we have done, is that it feels very much like early days in the non-confirming/specialist market where brokers need to be re-educated on how they actually present these loans to lenders. There are certainly enough lenders in the market now to actually give it validity again and that’s a part and parcel of where we see a drive from Bluestone’s perspective moving forward.

Anna Temple: This is Anna Temple reporting for Australian Broker Online.